• Marketplace, Tuesday, June 16, 2009 11:01 AM

The black-and-white checkered Vans that Sean Penn wore in "Fast Times at Ridgemont High" and that catapulted the brand into the mainstream in the 1970s were his own pair of shoes, Kai Ryssdal discovers in an interview with the company's vp of marketing, Doug Palladini, who has compiled a book that traces the development of the brand, Vans: Off the Wall. Sales doubled from $20 million to $40 million as a result of Penn's exposure, but Palladini says it was a double-edged sword because the exponential growth occurred "without any sort of discipline whatsoever."

Plus, the teen market was something of a mystery to marketers of the day. "You have to remember that back when the company started the general mindset in the advertising community was that teens were not an audience worth reaching," Palladini says. "It's like what are you going to do with a kid's paper route money? How are you going to make a business out of that?"

How does the brand stay relevant today? "At the end of the day," says Palladini, "what you're doing is you're capturing cool."

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